


the pain of walking

by Rigil_Kentauris



Category: Fire Emblem Heroes
Genre: Angst, Canon typical mentions of violence, M/M, POV Second Person, Pre-Canon, chapter 13 spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-17
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-12-30 18:44:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12114891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rigil_Kentauris/pseuds/Rigil_Kentauris
Summary: He can't have realized it, but once, as you traveled together, you tried to kill him.





	the pain of walking

**Author's Note:**

> mild abuse of how spell casting works in fe:h lore
> 
> also. lightning bugs is a colloquialism for fireflies. i like using lightning here better, cause. like. technically zacharuno is a blue mage and in fe:h they use thunder. except he has snow magic? i think? i digress.
> 
> this thing needs a better title. i will give it one later, when i can actually stay awake for more than a few seconds at a time

Patrols have to be done every night, so every night Alfonse wanders over. Every night coming precariously close to you, glancing over to see if you’re looking, shifting from one foot to another with his sword gripped tight in one hand, the other worrying with the diadem that his parents force him to wear whenever they can. A constant reminder of why, when he wanders over, you find something else to busy yourself with. A scale on your armor falling in the wrong way, a smudge on your lance. It’s hard to distract yourself when you’re already distracted by the hesitation in his step. You do him two favors, though. The first: when night falls you always find yourself near other heroes, and more than that, other heroes he might like to take on a patrol instead. When he hesitates, when he falters…he always has someone else to go to.

Most nights when he walks by, your blood is already writhing like a live thing. The voice in your head already whispering about the chinks in his armor, about his vulnerability, how _easy_ it is, how _vital,_ your lance is in your hand and it tells you every time he’s near exactly how close he is and how quickly you could close that space-

The second thing you do for him is check the sneer that takes over. Because it’s not directed at him. It’s for you.

But he can’t know that.

On the best of nights, you manage a third thing. You leave entirely. You find a rise on a hill in a field, or a copse of trees near the castle. A dark spot in the courtyard. The parapets on an unused tower. Anywhere he can’t see you. Anywhere he doesn’t have to think…whatever it is he thinks. Anywhere where you don’t have to fight yourself.

The third thing has become harder and harder. You’ve started having nightmares about hurting him. The third thing has become necessary.

**-**

He puts too much of his weight on his left foot. Back when you were children, when you first began sparing with him, it was a flaw to be exploited. Then, it was something to help him train through. Finally, it had become a clever feint he’d use to trick you. He’d gotten good, back when he’d been training with you.

You can’t tell if he’s doing it on purpose now, as he walks up. Signaling his approach, or the return of a bad habit?

It doesn’t matter.

_Weakness,_ the voice in your head points out, and catalogues it alongside all the other ones.

“Zacharias,” he says softly, standing behind you.

_Two feet,_ the voice estimates, _one second._

It berates you for casting aside your lance earlier, criticizes you for letting it sit in the grass several meters away. Hates you for not being prepared for this moment.

He’s two feet away, then he steps forward and sits in the grass beside you. Two feet, to two inches.

_I suppose you’ll simply have to strangle him, then,_ the voice says, disappointed. Except it’s not the voice; that’s never so polite. Which means it’s your own thoughts. _No._ If you’d eaten at all today, you might have thrown up on the grass then and there. You might anyway. This isn’t you. You’ll never _let_ it be you.

“Zacharias?” he asks.

_You will not look at him,_ you command yourself.

It’s another thing you fail at.

His arms are wrapped around his knees, holding on to the edges of the ceremonial brass and gold tassets. His eyebrows are furrowed with concern. His shoulders are tense.

He isn’t wearing the diadem.

You bite back a harsh _what_. He’s your friend, whether or not you are his.

“Alfonse,” you say, a neutral tone the best you can do. Less than you want to give him. Far less than he deserves.

He sits in the evening silence, hovering in the absence of conversation. In the distance, far across the field, lightening bugs cast their first few flickers. Alfonse starts pulling up grass in tiny bursts you aren’t sure you’d notice if the curse poisoning your blood didn’t keep track of all of his motions. In another situation, in another life, you’d think about holding his hand.

Instead, you think about pinning him to the ground, snatching his sword, and cutting his Askran heart out.

The world shakes slightly as the familiar sense of mild vertigo sets in.

"You need to participate in patrols," he says. Steady breathing. Clear eyes. Still pulling at the grass.

He has several arguments prepared, and he’s ready to use them. You can see it in the set of his jaw. You could argue. He’d say something virtuous, something about turns or fairness. You could refuse. He’d let that stand. He’d let that excuse stand.

It’s what you should do.

“Please,” Alfonse adds, and not out of politeness. He’s inspecting the gauntness in your face, and the way your armor isn’t on quite right, and the way you are far beyond the edge of patrols but you haven’t bothered to keep your weapon at your side. Not politeness. Concern.

About _you._

It’s inane.

You laugh, and that only serves to strengthen Alfonse’s conviction. He frowns and reaches out a hand but pulls it back. He’s more concerned than he was before and that simply makes you laugh all the more.

Anything but listening to the voice in you heard shouting _do, go, yes._

The curse is stronger than you expected, though. When you force away your laughter, and turn to him to say _no,_ you say _yes_ instead.

The curse is stronger than you expected.

Or, you are weaker than you expected.

He smiles out of relief and gratitude, and warmth spreads through you. Warmth, satisfaction, and a desire to make him smile again strong enough to delude you into thinking this is a good idea.

_Weakness,_ you think to yourself, but it sounds an awful lot like the voice.

**-**

It becomes increasingly apparent that he doesn’t need you for this. There are numerous different patrol routes. He picked the simplest. A ploy. You fell for it. You _wanted_ to fall for it. He asks you how you are. _Well,_ you lie. He mentions offhandedly he’s knows you haven’t been eating. Or sleeping. Or training. He mentions he knows you’ve been packing.

_Of course he does,_ you remind yourself. Of course he knows what’s going on in his kingdom. He’s Askran royalty.

“If you have plans to depart…” he says stiffly, picking his way through the words one by one, looking at the ground. Counting the curves and points on Fólkvangr’s pommel. “We would prefer…”

He stops walking.

“If you’d like to leave, you may,” he says quietly. “I’ll see to the details.”

“My thanks,” you say, quickly, before saying _no_ to him becomes too difficult. It feels like swallowing ice, hard lumps of it that freeze you inside out.

The curse has your back, though.

When you say thank you, it surges.

“But, I would rather stay,” it adds on your behalf.

Alfonse relaxes, tension bleeding free of his face, his arms, even the fingers clenching his sword loosen.

“Then the packing…?” he asks, with no confusion, only easy trust that you’ll tell him, and that you’ll tell him the truth.

“I wasn’t,” you lie.

He nods, smiling. He trusts you more than he does his advisors, or whomever it was who told him what you were doing.

He walks a little closer to you for the rest of the night.

_Four inches. Half a second. Beat his head in._

You stay as far away from him as you can.

**-**

You’d run into trouble around midnight; you’d fought the trouble to a standstill, and Alfonse had finished the Emblians off.

Alfonse had been prepared to keep moving. The patrol had needed doing. There was an order to these things. He was needed back at the castle.

You’d agreed.

It’s ten minutes before you can’t keep it hidden from him.

He takes hold of your arm with a determined _may I?_ Somehow a _you may_ escapes through your teeth. The gash is long, and deep. He hisses in sympathetic pain when he touches the edges of the injury, even though you remain silent. You are waiting for the voice to come back and remind you about _head locks_ and _blood chokes_ and a million nightmare things you can’t think up on your own.

“If we bind it…” Alfonse thinks out loud, voice trailing off as stares at it.

The voice is absent. There is gentle, dark night wind carrying the sound of insects. There is your own heartbeat, too loud. And there is Alfonse, huffing air from his nose as he comes up with and rejects a hundred half-formed plans.

“Are you able to walk?” he asks, “You need a healer.”

_And they are all back at the castle,_ he does not say, but you know what he means.

“I can,” you affirm.

“Of course,” he says, this time not saying _you were walking before, I’m not certain why I asked._

You want to reassure him, to tell him he’s not silly for asking. It’s not silly to be concerned.

It is, though. Being concerned about you could get him killed.

Not right now, though. Right now, the voice is gone. The only movement in your veins is your pulse. You aren’t calm, per se, but…settled. It’s going to be okay. You’ll make it; he’ll make it.

He lets go of your arm. You drop to the ground. You don’t realize how much he was supporting you until you’re there, lying in the dirt, the world looping in lazy dizzy arcs.

You understand where his worry came from.

He kneels beside you, dropping as fast as you did, sword and sheath clattered beside him as he lets them go. One hand going for your wrist, the other going to check your breathing.

It’s not enough to reassure him.

“Lie still,” he commands. His voice is distant, difficult to hear. Strange. He’s so close to you.

He glances at your eyes, his own widening slightly. He shakes your shoulder, hard.

“Zacharias!” he says.

You know it’s the blood loss in from your arm. It doesn’t make a difference. In a way, that’s better. Perhaps, you think, its why the voice is finally gone. Bled out. Perhaps the answer is truly that simple. Freedom, that easy. You’d thought of it, but Alfonse and Sharena would have been devastated. Here and now, though…

It’s okay.

And, you think as your vision blurs, this is likely as good as it could have been. The voice is gone; it’s left you in peace. And you died doing something good, fighting Embla. Mother would be proud. And, you think, and…

And you are with someone who cares about you.

Who you care about, in return.

He shakes you again, repeats your name, voice cracking on a misplaced bit of panic.

“Don’t…” you mumble, forgetting what you meant to say before you’re finished with the word.

The world goes grey and black, then it goes sunlight white.

You hear him say _I can’t lose you._ You’d hold on to the heartbreak in his voice but this might be his best chance.

You ignore him instead, and surrender.

**-**

When you wake up, he’s passed out on the ground next to you. His cloak is torn up, parts of it wrapped in strips around your arm. The rest of it is wound around his own arms, damp red.

Fólkvangr lies flat on your chest, the ice blue gem embedded in the base still pulsating with the aftereffects of magic, your fingers resting on the hilt. His blood on the cutting edge.

A simple solution to what must have seemed to him a terrible problem. Part of you can appreciate his directness.

The rest of you is horrified. You recognize the magic like you’d recognize a song. _Sol._ Meant for battle, meant for leeching the life from your enemies. Not meant for this. Not this. That he’d succeeded, even a little, that he’d _tried…_

You push yourself upright, and the world remains a dizzy, unsteady mess, but that’s nowhere near as pressing as the sloppy, loose bandages he’d managed to put on himself. Fix them. It takes you several long minutes to undo the makeshift bandages. Several long seconds to stop staring at the ragged, thin lines on both his arms, parallel to the one you’d had. Rivulets of Askran blood rolling down his skin, trailing down and tracing and patterning rivers out on his arms.

Something in your veins yawns, and shakes itself awake.

Fólkvangr is beside you, the silver and gold and blood red shining under the hard white light of the gem.

Your hands close around his sword.

_Now,_ the voice says, and wrenches you back around to face him. It drags you stumbling to your feet. Ram the sword down his throat. Slip it through his ribs. Imbed it by his spine.

Turn around and leave him. He stirs in his sleep and shifts onto his side, a lock of deep blue hair drifting across his eyes, the blond tips coming to rest on the corner of his lips. You can’t shout louder than the voice in your head, but you try. It comes out as a choked whisper that he doesn’t hear. The wound in your arm is healed but it aches anyway, the phantom pain spreading and constricting and making it hard to breathe.

You’re stronger than this. You won’t let this be you. The bright brassy gold of his armor reflects the ice white of Fólkvangr. The hateful Askran bastard is right in front of you, _three feet and two seconds_ away. Soft, vulnerable little brat, arrogant in his insistence that he was safe, that _Askr_ was safe. No. No, this is Alfonse. This hatred isn’t yours.

The way his hair falls is disgusting. ~~~~

You solve the problem. You kneel at his side and brush the fair free from his face. Delicate. Free of scars. Never had to work for anything. You gather the lock of soft hair in your fist, and sever it with Fólkvangr.

The pain coiling around your insides lessens.

You let the edge of the blade rest on his forehead. He doesn’t move. Doesn’t notice. Doesn’t seem to care. Why would he? Pathetic, asinine, trusting, careful, kind. He trusts you. He accepted you. He loves you. He might even like you.

“Alf…” you try to say, try to warn him. Wake him. Anything. The twisting, malevolent thing in your mind seizes you, grip you hard in its jaws like a wild dog. Points of sharp pain biting into your shoulder. The pressure too much. The world is one shaking mass of vertigo.

_Kill him,_ it commands, overriding and insistent.

Drawing the blade away from him, even for a few inches, is excruciating. Placing it back on his throat is as easy as blinking.

A flick of the wrist, and that would be the end. Askran spawn dead by his own sword. His chin is tucked against the blade like it’s a blanket, not a cold, relentless weapon.

Fólkvangr is heavier than it has any right to be. You press on it. You let the sharp, polished edge nick the edge of his skin. The small, wet beads of blood are nearly invisible in Fólkvangr’s fading light.

You move the sword slightly, just to see if you can, and oh yes, you can. The heaviness of the metal is weightless when you move it, even the space of a finger’s width. The trace of blood sparse and small but there.

Fólkvangr gives one more pulse of frigid light, and the spell hanging on to it dies. The red on Alfonse’s throat, the gold and steel glint of his sword, the ground and the air and the sky all disappear into the moonless night. Fólkvangr is glowing again before your eyes have a chance to adjust. The magic empties from you into the gem, a force of habit you were sure you’d lost. The gem’s surface frosts over in ugly, jagged patterns. It turns the light into something soft, though, and in it…

You’ve nearly slit Alfonse’s throat. The injury is clear in the light. You’ve hurt him. You almost _killed_ him. You’ve hurt him, seriously and badly this time. You… you…

The curse hits hard, hits like taking an Emblian hammer to the chest. And while you’re gasping inside, while you’re choking on the pain snapping through your bones, it moves.

It grabs Fólkvangr with both hands and stabs it down at Alfonse’s stomach.

You scream inside and push yourself forward.

The edge of his sword deflects against the gold scales on his side, sliding against the metal, tearing open his uniform but none of it matters once the sword embeds in the ground beside him. It’s flush against his side, but it’s enough. So very barely enough.

The curse seethes with fury. Stepping backwards is like stepping into fire. Nothing is as bad as seeing Fólkvangr implanted in the dirt next to Alfonse’s sleeping body. The pain of walking doesn’t dull. It worsens. You take the steps anyway, and are desperately glad you still can.

**-**

When dawn comes, you are far away. You know how he’ll react. How all the Askrans will react. They’ll set people looking for you. You’ve a head start, though, and a frightened, stolen horse, and a long history of practice operating on the edge of exhaustion. You’ll make it.

**Author's Note:**

> zacharuno. all i'm saying. zacharuno would solve the _zacharias | bruno_ problem. cause i never have any fuggin clue what to tag this stuff. anyway. i'd say someone get that man a hug, but i really don't know if that's gonna help anymore


End file.
